First impressions, Berat, Albania

My first adventure of the summer of 2015 took off in Albania on 18th of May, as we explored an ancient town of Berat for a week, documenting the life and traditions of the locals with a group of student photographers from Lahti Institute of Design. This trip was a part of a documentary course run by Stefan Bremer, where we had daily tasks of confronting locals for photographs, stories and more.

For this course, Berat turned out to be the perfect town. A scenic town, filled with interesting stories and history in a country ravaged by tyranny (see Enver Hoxha) not so long ago. During my stay I have made friends all over the city, visited a local high school and been invited to a traditional family house in the suburbs. Still, under all the beauty lies complex social problems that become very transparent as you take few steps away from the touristy main boulevard. Inequality between men and women, drug trafficking and the thug culture are the first things you start seeing as you observe.

Still, as I observed I also got very close to some youngsters around my age, made friends and had some of the most eye-opening conversations of my life in there. Despite the hardship that this country has gone through -or maybe because of that- respect and honesty are very valued traits in Albania. Once you show that you are truly interested and treat everyone with a smile, there is no threat and you will have a very unique experience in Albania.

View fullsize

I really look forward to seeing how this country probably changes in a very short time span. I'll be back here someday again.

#joingermantradition

On April 23rd-27th, I visited Saarland, Germany along with 10 other Instagrammers on German Tourist Board's very first sponsored tour. The location itself, Saarland is still an unknown territory for international travelers, so it was our job to expose this beauty to the world through Instagram. Location-wise, Saarland is culturally mixed with French, so among countryside walks we were treated with traditional German sausages and Crème brûlée, an interesting mix of both countries.

Apart from the goals of the trip, this one stood out as one of the greatest trips in terms of company. I met with many long-time Instagram friends for the first time in real life: Thomas (@Thomas_k) and Uwa (@uwa2000) from Berlin, and Anthony (@takinyerphoto) from New York taking the lead for being active friends from the very start (almost 5 years now), but also new great people that I can proudly call friends. List of the 'grammers at the end of this post!

@ovunno

@pdy

@takinyerphoto

@giorgette_p

@chaiwalla

Behind the scenes: #joingermantradition

Check out the whole crew:

@uwa2000
@thomas_k
@nathparis
@ovunno
@giorgette_p
@chaiwalla
@pdy
@takinyerphoto
@tzuio

Transtrash

Style/Design: Emmi Sofia Kuusajoki
Model: Lauri Järvinen

See the final set here

In the end of March I shot a fashion editorial for Emmi Sofias's diploma work, "Transtrash". As you can see, it was an over the top shoot. Location, club Torvi in Lahti, Finland is as intense and gritty as the design in Emmi's clothes, so for contrast and story we decided to add some charisma by hitting the local small grocery store for the last pictures.

Special thanks for the awesome work done by the model Lauri, who really got into the character and pushed boundaries with his poses.